This Justin Bieber thing is out of control, as proven by the Free Scooter movement

Before we get into the whole Free Scooter thing, which is mind-blowing on a couple levels and takes a little explaining, let's take a second to think about Justin Bieber, who is probably a stranger pop star than Lady Gaga. Above is a video of Beiber performing his hit "Baby" on, of all places, The View. He raps Ludacris's verse. Little girls scream their approval. Our head explodes.

So now you've seen it. A few more things about Justin Bieber:

1. He was born the year before 'N Sync formed.

2. Unlike his pre-teen pop predecessors (Miley Cyrus, The Jonas Brothers), he was never on the Disney channel, or any other channel for that matter. He was discovered on YouTube.

3. Miley Cyrus and The Jonas Brothers are his predecessors.

4. Usher won a bidding war with Justin Timberlake to sign him.

5. He is massively, ridiculously, bafflingly popular. As evidenced by the Free Scooter thing, which is what we're actually writing about here.

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The Free Scooter story starts in a New York mall in November, where Bieber was supposed to appear. The crowd got huge and unruly, and the cops told Bieber's manager, Scott "Scooter" Davis, to Tweet that the show was cancelled. They say it took him an hour and a half to send two Tweets. He says it took seven minutes.

The crowd went crazy and rioted. People were injured. Scooter was arrested. Again: For not Tweeting expediently, which the cops are calling reckless endangerment. The full story can be read here.

Now, in the fine tradition of Free _____, Bieber and his fans are seeking justice or publicity or whatever by wearing Free Scooter T-Shirts and, naturally, tweeting about it.

We're not really sure what else to say. Welcome to the future, we suppose.

Kiernan Maletsky is Westword's music editor. His writing has appeared in alt-weeklies around the country as well as Miley Cyrus's mom's Twitter feed.